All of these thoughts—these not-so-vague evaluations in the blink of a sulphurous eye; and the monster lifted its right foot out of the pine needles, reached forward and used a hooked toenail as sharp as a razor to slit Layla’s gown of fine-tanned skins from the deep vee of her neckline down to her knees, then brushed the two halves aside to display her naked body.
Paralysed with terror, Layla was unable to move a finger to protect herself; and now the creature’s jaws were opening wide, its crimson tongue licking ravaged lips, while that same hooked appendage reached slowly, calculatingly toward her breasts! The ancient thing’s intentions were perfectly obvious as it hunched its back and lowered its slavering, gaping jaws toward her quivering flesh. Why, with a single tearing bite this monster could slice into a breast like a warm knife through butter, severing its soft tissues to scoop it whole from the ribcage—
—But that wasn’t going to happen.
Close beside Layla, Zach saw what the old fly-by-night was about, gave up groping for his shotgun and threw up his arms to ward the thing off. But while the monster’s flesh felt horribly dry, coarse and cold to the touch—as a long-dead, or undead, thing should feel—still it had unbelievable weight and strength; so much so that Zach moaned his desperation as he realized that his arms could either yield or break, but they could never stop this terrific, inhuman force from descending!
On the other side of Layla, a fraction less than three feet away, Big Jon Lamon had stopped trying to raise himself up from between slippery forked roots, and having reloaded his revolver he now pointed it at the old vampire’s head and pulled the trigger—over and over again—before sobbing aloud and throwing the useless weapon aside! And:
Damn this rotten ammo to hell! Big Jon’s thoughts were chaotic—his mind in a whirl as he looked for a miracle and found nothing at least until the thought occurred: If only I…if only I had a knife!
What? A knife—
—But he did have a knife! He always had a knife, or rather his machete, which he used in clearing the way through tough or dense undergrowth; or when making camp; or at any time when its sharp heavy blade was needed, as when he’d used it on the sling of Ned Singer’s machinegun. It was simply that he’d never foreseen or imagined having reason to use it in hand-to-hand combat with an ancient fly-by-night, that was all. No, for as the onetime scavenger in Jon Lamon remembered well enough, that’s what guns were for…when they worked!
But as for right now…
He slipped the machete from its oiled leather sheath on his broad belt, and despite his predicament—jammed between forking roots from the waist down—twisted his body and swept his weapon outwards, inches from the ground, with all the strength he could muster. And a moment later:
“Ahhhh!” The leader sighed his satisfaction; for while the old monster’s spidery limbs were deceptively strong, still they were no match for the razor-sharp edge of his machete. The vampire’s clawed right foot—more like a hand than a foot proper—had been about to cup Layla’s left breast, preparing the targeted flesh for gaping jaws and yellow fangs that had descended to no more than five or six inches above the girl’s writhing body, when Big Jon’s curved blade chopped through its right wrist and threw the thing completely off balance!
Wailing, hissing its pain and snatching back its right foot in an attempt to stabilize itself, the thing teetered and began to topple. Then, somehow regaining control, it turned its awful head to glare its furious hatred at its attacker. But the leader’s blood was up, and while it remained his blood, his loathing would continue to more than equal that of this grotesque enemy! And as the half-crippled thing made to lurch more surely in his direction, so he swung his machete again.
Such was his strength, the renewed vitality Big Jon derived from the knowledge of even partial success, that the force, the sheer impetus of his second blow helped jolt him loose from the grip of the forked roots. Not only that but this time he’d been better able to aim, to direct his blow, and the ancient fly-by-night’s right foot and taloned toes would never again threaten anyone!
Keening its frustration as much as its pain, the monster’s scrabbling at the leaf-mould threw up dust, dirt and pine needles where it jerked and skittered like some crippled, poisonous insect. Yet forgetting the girl and intent now upon its tormentor, still it made every effort to propel itself towards him. Big Jon rolled away from it, and rolled again, well clear of the creature. Until finally, scrambling to his feet and taking his machete in his left hand, he was able to grope at his leather belt for his back-up weapon…only to curse his luck. The holster was still there, but empty! He’d lost the handgun somewhere in deep leaf-mould and deeper gloom!
Now, more surely aware of Big Jon’s skill with his machete, and having seen the leader clamber to his feet, the old fly-by-night somehow contrived to half-float half-lever itself upright and turn its attention once more on Layla and Zach. By now they too were on their feet; and Zach, having recovered his pump-action shotgun, was in the process of giving it a frenzied shaking, trying to dislodge dirt from its clogged muzzle, when the ancient thing launched itself at him.
Meanwhile Ned Singer and the last two members of his ambush party had come drifting together in that weird, forward-leaning mode of the fly-by-nights, out of the pine- and cordite-scented gloom, and were just in time to witness what next occurred: the coup de grace served on one of the oldest of their kind by both Zach and Big Jon, working as a team and in perfect unison.
Coming from behind the thing where it teetered on one foot and a severed ankle, the leader crouched low and lopped at its left knee with his machete. Bones that had seemed so immensely strong were suddenly powdery as chalk; they crunched audibly as Big Jon’s deadly blade slashed through them, and spurting yellow goo the leg was severed. With its right knee folding and its left stump crashing down into the leaf-mould, the once-rearing monster was reduced to a height of little more than five feet!
Desperately flapping its arms, it tried in vain to keep its balance; at which Zach pumped a shell into his shotgun’s breach, rammed the barrel up under the vampire’s chin as the thing came toppling forward, and pulled the trigger. The hot blast as five inches of his weapon’s barrel exploded at the muzzle and peeled back on itself was enough to knock Zach off his feet again; but while he was merely dazed the monster’s head had flown apart in a spray of stinking pulp!
The old horror was dead, yes; but now, apart from Big Jon’s machete, Layla and the two men were unarmed. And there drifting toward them out of the smoky darkness, Layla’s worst nightmares were about to come true in the shape of an even greater menace: a trio composed of Ned Singer’s last two ambushers…and even worse, Ned Singer himself!
Ned’s voice was a rasping sigh, yet as nerve-shredding as a shovel in cold ashes, as he floated closer and reached his long arms toward her. “Ah—Laylaaa! So very good to see you again. But look—” his burning gaze focused on her near nudity, greedily drinking it in where her ripped gown hung open, “—it would appear you knew I was coming, for see how you’ve prepared yourself! And I do appreciate that…ahhhh!” His bottom jaw fell open, dribbling yellow and grey slime.
The three creatures separated, each of them moving toward a chosen target: Ned to Layla, the other two intent upon Zach and Big Jon. And sensing his revenge so close, Ned’s chuckle was as ugly as black bubbles bursting in an oily swamp as Layla turned to flee, tripped on a root, and tumbled once more to the forest floor.
In the next instant he stood over her. He was still unmistakably Ned; thinner and less solid-seeming, perhaps, but apart from his eyes and the length of his face and jaws, his features were mainly unchanged. Ned’s lust, however, was something else; it literally radiated from him! Lust, hatred, and the merciless cruelty in his every move, his every word as he hissed:
“There’s only one thing missing, yesss! That horny Slattery youth who you preferred to me! But Ned Singer—the man he used to be—is still in here…well, somewhere. And soon he’ll be in you! But
where’s that horny pup now, eh? Oh, ha, ha, haaaa!” And reaching down he took her wrist and lifted her effortlessly to her feet.
“Oh, don’t cower so!” he told her as she tried to pull back from him. “You can be Layla for a little while longer, at least until you’re tried and tested. Oh yes, tested first and then tasted! That’s the least I can do: let you go on being the Layla I’ve known so well, but never well enough, until we’ve shared this, that and the other together—but mainly the other—and you’re ripe for the change. For there’s little of sensuality in the night by night existence of a vampire bride, and you should get what you can while you can. So I’ll have you as you are now, then have you forever the way you’re going to be!”
Still cringing from him, Layla tried shaking herself loose; Ned only laughed and carried on speaking:
“I considered letting this so-called ‘leader’ and this old cripple watch me pleasuring you, but…ahhhh!” Suddenly aware that the situation was changing, his molten silver eyes pierced the gloom this way and that, until rather more urgently he went on: “But no, not here and not just yet. Instead, we shall watch them—we’ll watch both of them die!”
Even going unheard by human ears, Ned’s orders were sensed by the creature standing over Zach where he lay dazed and deafened among the leaf-mould; also by the vampire that Big Jon was facing down with his machete. And now that pair of monsters began to move with more purpose; the one hunching forward, reaching for Zach, while the other advanced on Big Jon, apparently regardless of the heavily slimed weapon he was flourishing before him.
Meanwhile the rest of the encampment was returning to something akin to normal. Voices, nervous and urgent, but no longer quite so fraught, were sounding throughout the entire area, and even the gloom was being pushed back as more lamps began flickering into life. From not too far away a male voice called out: “Here’s another! Oh my God! It’s young Greg! He’s been savaged, blood drained…but he isn’t dead! I’m sorry Greg, but as the good Lord’s my witness, you’ll never be undead!” This was followed at once by the decisive, echoing crack of a gunshot…
Other voices were calling, answering each other across the length and breadth of the camp. There were other gunshots, too, and the wailing of women and children—even some menfolk—as the butchered, dead and undead alike, were dealt with as mercifully and swiftly as possible: irrevocable denials of any monstrous recoveries.
From the direction of the bridge over the river, the rallying cry of defenders was heard: the voices of those men who had gone down to the bridge crossing to reinforce Garth’s team. Reentering the forest prepared to fight, they didn’t know what to expect, couldn’t know that the internal ambush and the fighting was all but over—all but the threat to Layla Slattery and the men who were risking their lives to protect her.
Ned Singer saw the danger. Human figures were hurrying to and fro in every direction, their flashlight beams cutting pale swathes through the gloom, along with which their hoarse voices reached out before them as they came ever closer:
“Big Jon, is that you?” Chief tech Andrew Fielding’s voice.
Followed up at once by: “What the hell…?” in the gravelly tones of perimeter boss Don Myers, as he and Fielding materialized more surely out of the shadows.
“Over here!” the leader shouted, recoiling from his attacker’s deceptive, almost aimless seeming advances: in fact clever manoeuvres that brought the vampire ever closer. But the newcomers had already apprised themselves of the situation—at least some of it.
They saw Zach on his back in the pine needles, jabbing at the thing that leaned over him with his shotgun’s splayed muzzle; saw Big Jon dancing his deadly dance with his own creature; but they failed to see Ned Singer, where he clapped his coarse hand over Layla’s mouth and half-dragged, half-carried her behind the bole of a giant evergreen.
And there in the safety of a somewhat deeper gloom he whispered throatily in her ear: “No entertainment for us here, dear Layla. So it appears we must make our own, but safely away from this place, eh?” with which he cast about, seeking a route from the central area to the perimeter, and beyond it to the darker heart of the forest.
Even as he did so, however, suddenly out of nowhere—
—What was this? Ned found himself wondering. This strange irritation—an invasive something in the back of his mind—a vague yet oddly familiar…contact?
Who or what was probing his innermost thoughts, and through them tracking him!?
Then, as Ned sniffed at the air and his vampire senses penetrated the night:
And what, or who, was this grim shape advancing upon him so surely and determinedly through the gloom? No fly-by-night ally of Ned Singer’s, that much was certain! Nor any need to inquire further, as the bruised and limping figure drew closer.
For finally Ned recognized Garth Slattery, while simultaneously he “heard” his enemy’s vengeful message:
Softly softly catchee monkey, Ned! That bitterly cold voice stabbed like an icy knife at his vampire mind. And again: Softly softly catchee monkey—you ugly undead bastard thing…!
No more than fifteen paces away, around the curve of the mighty tree’s bole, Don Myers took aim with his self-loading rifle and fired at the legs of Big Jon’s attacker where it was side-stepping the leader and putting him off balance. But even as it got within range of its intended victim, so Myers’ shot blew one of its knees apart; and keening, flapping its arms, the thing toppled sideways. Big Jon saw his chance, took one short pace forward and aimed a devastating blow at the vampire’s scrawny neck. Its head came loose, flew free; its body collapsed into itself and crumpled to the spongy ground; it twitched and lay still.
Now Myers turned his weapon on Zach’s attacker—aimed and squeezed the trigger—and cursed as the gun jammed!
Myers looked around for Andrew Fielding, and saw the small, nervous chief tech fumbling with a bulky, ugly-looking machine gun. “It isn’t working!” Fielding cried out shakily. “I thought…thought I’d fixed the damn thing, but it’s still not working! It won’t fire!”
“Try freeing the bloody safety catch!” Myers yelled, scrabbling with desperate fingers where he tried to clear the breach of his own self-loader.
Frustrated by Zach’s jabbing with the splayed muzzle of his weapon, the surviving vampire was reacting to the shot that had killed its companion. As it straightened, turning its head away from Zach to see what was happening, he managed to rise up onto his good knee. And grunting from the great pain of the effort, he struck upwards, ramming his shotgun’s ragged snout deep into the creature’s groin.
Hissing furiously, it tore the weapon from its pulpy flesh, wrenched it from Zach’s hand and hurled it away; and raging, it turned again on its tormentor. This time there would be no holding it, no more problems from this now defenceless cripple!
But Myers had finally succeeded in clearing the inert round from his rifle’s breach; and having primed the self-loader with his very last bullet, he took careful aim and removed the monster’s head…
Then for a single moment there was silence, drifting smoke, and nothing else. But as Big Jon got Zach back up onto his feet a girl’s voice rang out: Layla’s terrified voice from somewhere close at hand, crying: “Garth, be careful!”
“Garth!” Zach cried. “Layla!” And with Big Jon helping him, he went hobbling in the direction of the girl’s voice.
While on the other side of the great tree:
Ned saw the rifle in Garth’s hands, saw its barrel shifting into a threatening horizontal position as his hated enemy began to lean into the weapon, centering its sights on him! He thrust Layla ahead of him between himself and the limping, bruised but determined figure of Garth, and called out:
“One more step, ’prentissss, and she dies here and now. And when your Layla’s dead what then? Will you be the one who makes sure she can’t come back? Best let me go, ’prentissss Slattery, and take this bitch with me. That way she gets to live at least a little while longer;
that’s unless you’d care to fire a round right through the whore and into me!”
“You’re going no further, Ned,” Garth choked the words out. And hearing the familiar voices of his father and the others as they appeared from behind the huge tree, he continued: “It ends right here.”
Ned saw the advancing men—Zach and Big Jon in front, Don Myers and chief tech Fielding behind—and knew that all of his plans were finally in tatters. There was no way now to make his escape and take Layla with him. Oh, how he had lusted after her warm, live body…but now, that was all she’d ever be when he was done with her: just a body, no longer alive but undead.
Taking her shoulders he turned the girl to face him, and:
One last kissss, he “spoke” to Garth. Just enough to put a little of me into her. Not as much as I had planned to put into her—definitely not where I intended to put it—but more than enough to infect her. And then the problem’s all yourssss, ’prentissss. Oh, ha, ha, haaaa!
Ned’s jaws cracked open and a long tongue flickered toward the girl’s mouth. Layla spat hard into his sulphur-yellow eyes, and with every ounce of her remaining strength wrenched herself back and away from him—wrenched so hard that her dress where Ned clutched it was ripped from her shoulders and left dangling from his bony hands.
Off balance as she flew backwards, Layla slammed into Garth dead-weight, knocking him off his feet. The barrel of his rifle was driven inches deep into leaf-mould as he went down with the girl on top of him, and under their combined weight ligaments in his right wrist tore as his hand crashed down in a tangle of roots. With the shock of his injury lancing through him, Garth couldn’t restrain an involuntary, agonized gasp. But worse yet, his weapon had taken the brunt of the fall and had broken apart at the hinged breach!
Ned Singer was torn two ways: he knew that without further ado he could flee into the forest, into the night. But his vampire senses were evaluating the situation. There were six human beings now, crowding that same area under the huge tree; six of them and only one fly-by-night, Ned himself. Yet while the late comers carried weapons—and despite that at almost point-blank range they could scarcely miss—still no one had fired a single round at him! Garth because he hadn’t dared risk it with Layla there, and now because he was down and injured—seriously, Ned hoped—and his rifle out of commission. But as for the others, what of them? They hadn’t fired at him either, possibly because…because they couldn’t? Was that it?